Background:

On a global level, conservation and management of natural resources by community based organisations is proving to be a successful strategy for achieving the following:

• Sustainable environmental and biodiversity conservation
• Empowerment of disadvantaged and marginalised communities and community groups giving them a greater voice in decision-making processes
• Addressing the livelihoods needs of poor people and helping to raising them out of poverty through their active involvement as users, managers and beneficiaries of natural resources managed in a sustainable way
• Tackling issues of social exclusion, discrimination and conflict through strengthened local community groups
• Promoting local democracy and active involvement of local people in governance

Several of these contribute either directly, or indirectly to internationally agreed development goals.

These broader impacts and benefits of participatory natural resource management are now starting to be recognised more widely through international and national policies and legislation and subsequent actions to implement them. However the situation is highly variable between countries and geographical locations. In some places considerable progress is being made whilst in others action it is still limited due to various constraints. Consequently, we believe that there is a need to support and promote such approaches more widely through the development of policies, advocacy, practical actions, research and shared learning.

We also believe that there is considerable potential for mutual support and shared learning between organisations involved in promoting and supporting participatory natural resource management in different countries - particularly between those organisations that already have considerable experience and capacity and those that still lack this. Whilst the process of learning and experience-sharing has often tended to be from the more developed countries to less developed countries, we believe that there is much greater potential for learning in different ways. In particular, there are opportunities for the transfer of skills and experience between organisations in different developing countries (these are limited at present whilst having considerable potential) and similarly, we believe that there is much to be gained in more developed countries from learning and experiences of participatory management of natural resources in less developed countries.

Forest Action UK aims to achieve these objectives through implementation of various actions that can be categorised under short-term and medium-term.